Show Me the Sky - Nicholas Hogg [47]
22 March 1835
Once more the horizon pitches and we walk on tilting ground. However, the voyage to Tonga will be a brief three weeks on the waves, and again I will be busied with the instruction of Fijian.
The Rev. Thomas, in comparison to the late Rev. Stevens, is a difficult and unruly student, contesting much of what I teach – despite his ignorance of my language – and most prickly towards any correction. I am shamed to admit that thoughts of sabotaging his progress have entered my mind, as the longer he is reliant upon me as his interpreter, the better I can temper his message. If it were him alone I were instructing, I fear the urge to filter his words would prevail, but as my class also contains the Rev. Collins, his wife, and their eldest son, I am true to the grammar and syntax of my mother tongue.
11 April 1835
I have had little time to sit with my journal this voyage, as mornings have been occupied teaching Fijian or assisting Rev. Thomas and Collins with a translation of Matthew 3:2: Repent ye, for the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand – to be used as an introductory service.
The afternoons have been available for the brethren and their families to ask questions about the manners and customs of Fijian society – twice the children have been sent away, firstly when the discourse ventured towards cannibalism, and secondly when I began explaining the ritual strangulation of widows upon the death of their husbands.
Mrs Collins quite recoiled at this sad truth, an act of love and obedience I once considered necessary, but now realise is no more than barbaric superstition.
14 April 1835
Rougher conditions – though the ocean is a millpond compared to the great storm that beset the Caroline north of New Holland – have not slowed our progress to Tonga, but the Collins family, after two years of landlubbing in Port Jackson, have been too seasick to attend classes.
Therefore it has been the Rev. Thomas and I alone, which has offered him the lead on the subject of Fijian customs. Once again I am fielding questions about our womenfolk, war, and the occasional detail of our many false gods. Since the change of office for Rev. Thomas, I have observed he has become most energetic about mission business, ensuring our supplies and livestock are prepared and ready to be unloaded, and making considerable progress in his Fijian – despite his reluctance to have myself as his teacher.
22 April 1835
Two days among the Tongans and I am overwhelmed with a desire to see my island. The mission in Nuku’ alofa has converted many heathen to Christian, and raises my spirits to what is possible in Fiji, as the happy Tongans seem ready to serve their new god with hearty willingness.
In an audience with King Tupou, we were presented with a pig and two baskets of yams, breadfruit and bananas. His majesty is a tall and well-muscled man, shining with coconut oil and that glorious Pacific sun. In his company, after ten years in dreary climes, I felt poorly before his gleaming health! Although he was at first curious about my time in England, he soon tired of hearing tales of a land he could not see – a trait of character shared by my Fijian brothers.
Am I to be a castaway for ever from the land of my birth? Stranded in some netherworld between England and Fiji?
24 April 1835
Sabbath, and the chapel bulged with a most eager congregation, all ears on the Rev. James and his service, finely delivered in impeccable Tongan. I believe the Rev. Thomas was simultaneously pleased and disheartened to attend, as despite not understanding a single word, he understood what sway the Lord may have when delivered in the language of his eager subjects.
On return to the bay Rev. Thomas began practising what Fijian he has thus far learned, and also